The Good Stuff? I Beg to Differ

Every day, I feel blessed to live where I can see God's creation evolving with the shifting seasons. Too often, people see Kansas as a flat, uninteresting place that just provides miles to go before you get to the mountains of Colorado or the lakes of Missouri.

I'm all for tourism in Kansas and helping others see the beauty and complexity of the beautiful place we call home.

But I just can't understand one popular form of tourism in Kansas these days. I suppose that storm chasing brings an infusion of some cash to gas stations, restaurants and motels in the Central Plains. But, to me, storm chasing just capitalizes on the pain and tragedy of others.

I don't want some adventure-seeking tourist hoping for that big storm that will give him a thrill for a few minutes.

Those storms take people's lives and property. I was heartbroken to learn that Tuesday night's storms took the lives of two members of a fellow Stafford County 4-H family and seriously injured another. Linda Gleason and her son, Jeffrey, were killed when a cottonwood tree, 4 feet in diameter, was toppled onto their vehicle by a tornado. The St. John family had pulled into a driveway to try to weather the storm. Kristin, who just graduated from K-State, was seriously hurt. I keep praying for her and for her dad, Jim, who now have to pick up the pieces of their lives.

The Stafford County Fair just won't be the same. The Gleasons and I had a contest for whose face could get the hottest and reddest first in the unairconditioned confines of the fair's 4-H building. They were superintendents of the 4-H arts and crafts department. I am across the way in the foods department.

Jeff (just like his sister Kristin before him) was a consummate baker and always had multiple entries in the 4-H foods division. With a mom who was a former county extension agent, they were always meticulously prepared. Jeff also had a gorgeous voice. The judge at the Stafford County 4-H Club Days this spring told him that he could do anything he wanted with that voice. I guess he's using it to sing with heaven's angels today.

I realize that some of the storm chasers are meteorologists collecting data to try and keep us safer. That's different than the people who are leading tours and charging folks anywhere from $2,000 to $6,500 to catch a glimpse of a tornado.

I know that the tourists aren't to blame for the storms. But it still infuriates me to read things like this on an msnbc.com website:

"Well, it's a rush," explains tornado tourist Mark Reese, from England, who was interviewed in Pratt. "In the UK, we don't get the big storms or the severe weather you get over here. This was the place to come to get the good stuff."

The good stuff, huh? I beg to differ. Let's ask Jim & Kristin Gleason ... or the residents of Joplin, Mo. ... or the people of Reading, Kansas ... or people still rebuilding their lives in Greensburg ... or the people of Chapman ... Unfortunately, the list goes on and on and continues to grow this spring.

The Big One

There I was, calmly watching the 10 o'clock news Sunday night, when out of nowhere, I was dumbfounded by the stupidity.

A storm chaser had the audacity to say they were in Kansas hoping for a big tornado. I believe the chaser was from WGN out of Chicago.

Does this guy realize they were beaming his image into living rooms across Kansas? And does he realize that we Kansans might be somewhat offended by that statement?

I wanted to reach through the screen and personally wipe the smile off his face.

I have seen what a tornado can do. I sang at the funeral of a man killed May 4, 2007. He was a man from my childhood, a neighbor of my grandparents. He was a husband, a father, a grandfather, a friend and neighbor.

He was one of those killed by what has been termed the Greensburg tornado. And while the impact that May evening was devastating to the Kiowa County town, it didn't just happen to Greensburg.

A Stafford County sheriff's deputy who was trying to keep the rest of us safe was also killed during the May 2007 tornado.

And the very next night - on May 5th - even more of my Stafford County neighbors and friends lost homes and property during another outbreak of severe weather and more tornadoes.

I have close friends whose rural home was totaled by the tornado in May 2007. And then, just a year later, we helped those same friends clean up the farmstead of his childhood home. While we rounded up cattle and cleaned up debris, his sister was in a Wichita hospital. Her recovery took months.

My friends at the Trousdale United Methodist Church lost their church in 2007. I took breakfast to their worship service in a member's home that following Sunday.

For a freelance writing assignment, I interviewed Greensburg residents who were working to rebuild their United Methodist church at the same time they were rebuilding their homes, their schools, their livelihoods and pretty much every aspect of their lives.

I was glad I didn't know about the tornado that struck Chapman and Manhattan until after it was over. My son was in a fraternity just 2 blocks south of where another fraternity had considerable damage.

One of the blogs I read regularly has posted about how a tornado changed life in her small Kansas town. I would encourage that WGN guy to check out Easy Street.

Would he still be able to grin when he talks about chasing the big one?

My parents were not worrywarts when it came to storms. We didn't run to the basement at the sight of dark skies overhead. But I do remember hearing the roar of a tornado as it went over our house one scary night while we were huddled together in the basement. The house was spared, but irrigation systems were not.

So I am appalled when someone has the audacity to say they are hoping - yes hoping - for a tornado outbreak.

I am thankful for meteorologists who warn us about severe weather. I know their work has made it possible to save people by making us aware of the dangers. I appreciate that some of the storm chasers do it to collect weather data.

But I still don't want to hear from some out-of-town tornado groupie that he hopes for the big one. He's talking about my home, my friends, my neighbors - whether they live down the road from me or halfway across the state.

My hugs and prayers to any families whose lives were changed in yesterday's storms in Kansas and Oklahoma.